1917 Ford Model TT Truck Cruises into 100 Years

Paul and Ginny Curtis’ 1917 Ford Model TT truck is celebrating its 100th birthday with a cruise-in car show during the Rushville Lions Club’s annual Community Days on Aug. 5.

“We had talked about having a birthday party for the truck,” said Paul Curtis, a Rushville Lions Club member, “and when we were looking for other things to do at Community Days this year, we thought about a car show featuring the 1917 Ford Model TT truck.”

However, the 100-year-old truck was not always a featured piece. Curtis’ father-in-law, Allen Loomis, spotted the car in a friend’s shed many years ago in the hamlet of Potter where it had been stored for 30 to 40 years.

Loomis was born in 1917, and learned to drive on a Model T, Curtis explained. He had tried to buy the car for many years, but his friend refused to sell it until 1997. From there, he brought it to his home on Loomis Road in Rushville, where he worked on its restoration until he died in 1999.

The Curtis couple took the car under their care and sent it out to be restored. Unfortunately, the condition of the wood was not good enough to save, Curtis added, though they used the wood as a pattern for the wood they used to restore it.